aesthetic experience

For my Art Education Foundations course, I made an interactive “sketchbook” if you will. In this course, we have been reading various essays and books about education, reading, and how the human brain works. This prompted the questions, “What if reading had never been invented? What if books used solely pictures to transcribe a message, rather than words?”

So, I decided to record a day in my life in this sketchbook. Concepts, ideas, feelings, events, and people I encountered are visually interpreted in this book. I used a combination of old and new doodles, which are little drawings I do while listening to music, bored, or in class.

I also wanted this book to have lots of different art media I personally use as an artist. This book is supposed to be a unique experience by the viewer. Each person that visually reads this will have different reactions, experiences, and feelings while flipping through. This book has collages of my drawings, paintings, intaglio prints, photographs, crayon, pastel, and india ink. The book itself is also like a sculpture and performance, it is a three dimensional object with a unique aesthetic experience for each person. In my opinion, all art provides visual interpretations that allow individuals to gain a unique aesthetic experience that cannot be recreated by anything else.

I have been working on this for quiet some time, and will continue to work on it. I like taking old, useless sketches or doodles combined with new ones created to make an entirely different piece. I’m excited to continue adding and subtracting from this book. When it is completely finished, I will post more images!

I feel as though when I’m sketching, I never know what to do with them, and they never feel finished, but making them into a collage sketchbook feels more finished than if I had just left them alone.

I actually had lots of fun making this project, combining my love for scrapbook and art into one. I included photos of the pages I feel are finished, there are many more, just they are not ready to be photographed yet! I’m excited to add onto this book, it’ll be a better way to doodle or sketch!